Monday, March 10, 2014

Reader report: The fabulous Rainbow Music is closing this year in the East Village


[Photo by Jessie Auritt]

Word is spreading that one of the neighborhood's more intriguing shopkeepers, a man known as the Birdman who works amid the stacks of used CDs, videos and cassettes at Rainbow Music, will be closing his store at 130 First Ave. in the coming months.

According to the Birdman, his landlord sold the building here near St. Mark's Place a few weeks before the end of 2013, and the new owner decided not to renew the store's lease. Rainbow Music has been on a month-to-month lease ever since, and he plans to sell his inventory via Amazon.com when the storefront is finally closed, per EVG reader Chris F.

In addition to all the items in the visible part of the store, the Birdman estimates that he has an additional 50,000 items in the back that he also needs to catalog.

Here's how the store was looking yesterday...


[Photo by EVG reader Chris F.]

A few years back Jessie Auritt made a 10-minute short about the Birdman... which you can watch right here...


You can read our Q-and-A with Auritt here.

[Thanks to EVG reader Chris F. for the tip]

Previously on EV Grieve:
The Birdman of the East Village

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14 comments:

  1. AnonymousMarch 10, 2014 at 6:49 AM

    Rockefeller, skanks, hitlery the evil veiled death hermaphrodite, anti human, United Nations of death, alciada, predatory anti human, human life, music, art, books, communist takeover cancer tumor brain skank maggots destroying earth. Nazis. Hold your ground, don't get pushed around, keep your store, fight for it! Mostly they kick you out and leave an empty store for 1 month at Halloween. Illegal real estate land grabs.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Choresh WaldMarch 10, 2014 at 7:17 AM

    Terrible news. I love this store. I hope it won't mean the same for 1st Ave Pierogi next door

    ReplyDelete
  3. ShawnMarch 10, 2014 at 9:57 AM

    Theme of 2013, 2014:

    "Landlord sold the building and _____________"

    Thanks for all the CDs, Birdman. I still have most of the ones I've bought from you!

    ReplyDelete
  4. 11:07 amMarch 10, 2014 at 11:07 AM

    The hipsters, Bloomberg's godsend billionaires, bros and the sorostitutes do not invade the EV so that they can go to into some dingy CD shop; they come here to consume cupcakes, froyo, biscuits, artisanal beef cheeks, sheep's head, alcohol, and each other.

    ReplyDelete
  5. GiovanniMarch 10, 2014 at 2:49 PM

    I'm sure the BroHos and WooHoos would much prefer another cookie-cutter Chipotle outlet since there isn't one on every block in the EV just yet.

    And the word of the day is now officially 'sorostitutes."

    ReplyDelete
  6. esquared™March 10, 2014 at 2:52 PM

    "The Cranberries are in the wrong spot." Maybe because zombies have taken over the EV.

    "who's gonna buy all that yogurt?" That sums it up.

    ReplyDelete
  7. AnonymousMarch 10, 2014 at 4:09 PM

    The East Village is such a fucking joke. No bookstores or real record stores (real = carrying current hardcore, punk, metal, and rap as well as indie rock), two lackluster live music venues. Name me one real dive bar in the EV besides Mona's.

    D

    ReplyDelete
  8. AnonymousMarch 10, 2014 at 4:36 PM

    Anon -

    Sophie's, Manitoba's, Otto's Shrunken Head, The Library, Double Down, Mama's?

    ReplyDelete
  9. genevieveMarch 10, 2014 at 4:38 PM

    The East Village that I knew is fast disappearing. All my stomping grounds and watering holes are gone.I'll stop by Rainbow Music very soon.

    ReplyDelete
  10. AnonymousMarch 10, 2014 at 5:23 PM

    I agree. Its a shame to see this place go.

    That said...$14 or $16 for a CD. Who buys at those prices?

    ReplyDelete
  11. AnonymousMarch 11, 2014 at 2:27 AM

    Sophie's, too, so exactly two dive bars in the EV, big whoop.

    Otto's Shrunken Head has a Tiki bar motif and the overwhelming majority of the photos on their Yelp page display this thus it can't be a dive.

    The Library, Double Down, and Mama's are more bro/sis bar than dive.

    When I think of dive I think of a place generations of people patronize, not just the 18-35 crowd like the places you listed save Sophie's.

    D

    ReplyDelete
  12. AnonymousMarch 12, 2014 at 2:50 PM

    I love the Birdman and I'll be sorry to see him go. I was even in the shop once when the inevitable happened -- someone accidentally started an avalanche! The Birdman was not happy. But I agree with the above comment about prices; at a place like this you'd think you'd get a little break.

    ReplyDelete
  13. AnonymousMarch 12, 2014 at 4:51 PM

    Ya I was at Library the other day -- a place where I used to basically live -- and where the chicks who used to run it a while back would've totally thrown out the bro's in the back screaming and whistling cos of some dumb thing they did. All dressed a like. Such dicks. Go back to fucking Fly-Over-Country you useless dipshits.

    ReplyDelete
  14. AnonymousMarch 17, 2015 at 12:40 PM

    Visiting there today as I wrote a song for new album about Birdman
    Band is The Small Change Diaries

    ReplyDelete

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